Vampires Will Never Hurt You
By silvermisery
Disclaimer: The lyrics belong to My Chemical Romance, an awesome band. Gerard Way is hot!! Draco and Hermione belong to JKR. Geez, I just can't win, can I?
A/N: I don't normally do song fics, but I was listening to this in the car and lyrics really spoke to me….please save my soul….
They were coming. They had found out where she was, and they were coming for her. At last. Well, the game is up, she told herself as she stared out the window of the deserted church, watching the sun, her last salvation, make its way slowly across the sky. You ran a good race, but in the end it happened as you always knew it would.
Footsteps sounded behind her, but she did not turn as pale white hands settled themselves on her shoulders. "I'm sorry," he said quietly.
"It's not your fault," she responded, still not turning from the window with its beautifully carved ornate frame, now layered in dust and cobwebs and partially rotted from age and neglect. His hands—long and slender and white, an artist's hands—clenched ever so slightly on her shoulders, and his face dropped towards hers, brushing a kiss against her neck.
Then she did turn, and raising her arms clasped them around his neck. He was not short, but not as tall as he had been in fifth year, before everybody else caught up, and he steadfastly refused to admit it. It was one of his little vanities that annoyed her. Well, in a few hours—she looked out the window, why was the sun moving so fast?—or more likely an hour, their time would be up and it would no longer be annoying. She wondered what it would like to be dead.
And if they get me and the sun goes down into the ground
And if they get me take this spike to my heart and
And if they get me and the sun goes down
And if they get me take this spike and
You put the spike in my heart
They had run a good race—the best one she had ever run—but of course Voldemort would win in the end, she had always known that, everybody had always known that, Harry had had tears in his eyes when he had given her and Draco this mission, but what could he do? They needed the information, and she was there. So dodging from alias to alias, changing her identity and shedding her past as easily as a snake sheds its old skin, until finally all their lies caught up to them and here they were, trapped in this abandoned old church, waiting.
Waiting for them.
She remembered as a child she had never believed in vampires and werewolves and the like. They were the stuff of horror movies and cheap paperback thrillers, of too much alcohol and overactive imaginations. Nothing for her to worry about. Her nightmares had been of serial killers and burglars and desperate men who needed money.
How ironic, then, that it had come to this, cornered like a wounded animal fighting for its life, waiting for Voldemort's chosen tools to come put an end to her life.
She turned to look at Draco, his silhouette falling against her. In the shimmer of the sunlight through the stained-glass windows, the oddly dark lighting that only an old Catholic chapel can have, he looked paler than ever. Almost as if he was a vampire already, she caught herself thinking, then shook those thoughts away. Death she could handle. Eternal solitude, she could not.
And so she found herself—the smart one, the one who always had an idea, a solution—on the verge of crazy, panicked, irrational fear. The shadows crept on, eating away at their fortress of light. She looked around and picked up an old wooden chair and broke it against her knee.
And if the sun comes up will it tear the skin right off our bones
And then as razor sharp white teeth rip out our necks I saw you there
Someone get me to the doctor, someone get me to a church
Where they can pump this venom gaping hole
And you must keep your soul like a secret in your throat
And if they come and get me
What if you put the spike in my heart
"You can't let them," Draco spoke up suddenly, his voice oddly loud in the still silence.
"Let what?" she asked, quietly. She was weary now, so weary, still clutching her makeshift stake to her as though it would do any good in the end, wondering if at least she could get one or two before they took her down.
"Not your soul," he insisted, intensity blazing in his eyes; one of the things she loved about him, the way he could be so alive, the way Harry was, life dancing around him and among his strands of hair and crackling in his very veins. "They can't have your soul."
"I can't stop them, Draco," she said calmly. Odd how his fear calmed her own.
"You must," he snarled, and at that moment, with the old candles flaring around them, a last-ditch attempt to ward off the encroaching darkness they had lighted, he looked almost possessed, a cornered animal with the primal instinct to protect his mate.
"Here," he said suddenly, calming down as quickly as he had fired up.
She looked at the wooden object she held in her hands, smiled, and cast away the old chair leg. It hit a pew with a thunk and rolled away into the darkness. Her fingers curled around the stake as though they belonged there as she glanced out the window. Any moment now.
And if they get me and the sun goes down
And if they get me take this spike and
(Come on!)
Can you take this spike?
Will it fill our hearts with thoughts of endless
Night time sky?
Can you take this spike?
Will it wash away this jet black feeling?
"With this, I can go down fighting," she said to Draco, wanting to reassure him. But his face contorted and he cried, "No!"
She looked at him, puzzled.
"Not for them," he murmured. "For me."
And then she understood, and with the understanding came horror, and shock, and almost equally, following on their heels, resignation, because she knew he was right, and she also knew she would do it.
She was no longer the idealistic schoolgirl who had dreamed up such a hopeless organization as S.P.E.W., the one who had fought for the DA and thought that maybe, she could make a difference. She had seen too many people die, too much senseless slaughter, to believe in any of that now. Her life, her mission, the need to live and fight, and her love for Draco, were the driving forces in her existence, and she knew that if it came to that, the need to live would overcome her love for Draco.
Again, unable to help herself, her head turned towards the window. Almost gone now. The sun was nothing but a sliver against the horizon. Already the darkness was beginning to eat away at the flickering circle of candles, stifling and mocking and not just an absence of light but a presence in itself.
And now the nightclub sets the stage for this they come in pairs she said
We'll shoot back holy water like cheap whiskey they're always there
Someone get me to the doctor, and someone call the nurse
And someone buy me roses, and someone burned the church
We're hanging out with corpses, and driving in this hearse
And someone save my soul tonight, please save my soul.
They backed up against the cross. Its beams were scarred and flawed, but it was still a cross, drenched with the holy water they had found still stored in the altar. It was stale and musty, but holy water nevertheless. Garlands of roses draped the cross and pulpit and altar besides them, cuttings of roses were strewn about them in a circle, and all round the candles flickered. Her hair was still drying from the drenching of holy water, and Draco smelled so strongly of the rose perfume his mother always loved.
As if any of it would do any good in the end.
But she smiled, because if she didn't she thought she would go insane, and looked at him and said bravely, "We're ready." But they weren't, and she knew that, and he knew that, and the darkness outside knew that, and chuckled and whispered malevolently.
Draco looked over at her, his grey eyes big and wide and too large for his pale face, his angelic blond hair in damp strands around his face, plastered to his skull, and she realized for the first time how scared he was. "I don't want to die," he confided to her, like a child telling his mother his greatest secret.
I don't want to lose my soul. I don't understand. What did we do wrong? Is it my fault? I'm too young to die. What will it be like? Will I remember you at all? All the words he were trying to convey to her, the thoughts he was trying to make her understand, flashed through her mind like a flash of lightning, and she realized how really and truly scared he was.
Can you take this spike?
Will it fill our hearts with thoughts of endless
Night time sky?
Can you take this spike?
Will it wash away this jet black now?
(Let's go! Come on!)
"You'll do it, won't you?" Reassurance. He was looking to her for reassurance that she understood, that she would keep her promise, that she would remember him as he was and not as he would become.
Reassurance she was not sure she had the right to give.
But how could she not? And so she closed her eyes and told herself she could to do this and nodded her head firmly. And he smiled and relaxed, because of course Hermione Jane Granger always kept her promises. She clutched her stake firmer and prayed.
And as these days watch over time, and as these days watch over time
And as these days watch over us tonight
And then—just like that—it happened. The sun went over the edge. The double doors of the church burst open. And all the window glass in the chapel shattered. The lights went out. They had arrived.
The first thing Hermione saw, after all the candles flared up in a blinding flash of light and went out to a host of eerie giggles, was Draco's Lumos, sending up a blaze of green wild fire, and a pair of deadly white hands reaching for her throat. She screamed and leaped backwards, holding up her stake like a sword and thrusting her small bouquet of roses at the undead creature.
The vampire screamed, a horrible thin sound that seemed to go on and on forever, freezing her veins and chilling her blood, falling backwards toward the floor.
But then another was reaching for her, and another, and another, until she felt she would be buried under a pile of grasping dead white hands.
"No!" she heard Draco scream from a great distance, and knew he was fighting his way to her, brandishing roses and throwing holy water and spearing them with pieces of old rotten wood. "Hermione! You promised!" And at the reminder of her duty, something inside her came to life and she began to struggle in earnest now, flinging small crucifix after crucifix, blessing whoever decided to keep a store of cheap wooden cross necklaces in the church storage room to give out to kids at VBS, flinging roses, and then, when she ran out, even the stems and single petals, anything that would let her live a moment longer.
And through it all, Draco, everywhere, taking blows meant for her, snarling in their faces until even the heartless, soulless creatures seemed intimidated, blond hair whipping in her face as he fought them off like a demon possessed—
I'll never let them, I'll never let them
I'll never let them hurt you not tonight
I'll never let them, I can't forget them
I'll never let them hurt you, I promise
He was so much life—vitality and youth and all that seemed alive and intense—she didn't understand it, not Draco, not him, not now—she couldn't comprehend—
Staring at him lying on the floor with two black holes stark against the white of his throat—
Vampires chuckling, withdrawing now they had had their fill of pureblood, they had the Malfoy boy, what use was this Mudblood who had only dirty blood, they served only themselves and not Voldemort—
Eyes wide and dark as they realized what had happened and he tried to look down at himself, run his tongue over his teeth and oh his eyes as he realized they were sharp—
"They got me, didn't they?" the question for which there was no answer.
Struck down, before our prime
Before, you got off the floor
"Hermione," his voice was weak, but clearly audible. "You promised…" but she could only stare dumbly at him lying on the floor, it was how she had known it would end, how it must end, but now that it had ended all she could feel was this numbing disbelief and oh, it was aching cold…
So very cold…
"Do it," her promise rings in her ears…
—the stake clutched in her cold, stiff fingers—
Blood seeping out of the wounds in his neck as he stares up at her, grey eyes compelling—
"Do it, Hermione, I can't hold myself back much longer—"
Does she want him to? Does he want himself to?—
Questions weave in her mind, darkness threatening to overtake her heart, all is confusion and despair and over all the shouting voices and mocking questions and wailing accusations is his voice, "Do it, Hermione. Do it."
—but this is Draco—
That's why you have to do this.
—Draco—
"Do it, Hermione."
Can you stake my heart? Can you stake my heart?
Can you stake my heart? Can you stake my heart?
(And these thoughts of endless night
bring us back into the light
and this venom from my heart) Can you stake my heart? Can you stake my heart?
(And these thoughts of endless night
bring us back into the light
kill this venom from my heart) Can you stake me before the sun goes down?
She closed her eyes and raised her arm.
"Do it, Hermione."
She thrust downward with whoosh.
His eyes closed.
The breath left him in a single gasp.
And she was left staring at him in a heap on the floor, all that was left of what was once full of life.
I killed my lover.
Then it hit her. But she had no tears left. And so she was left standing there, cold and numb and ice.
Behind her the flames crackled, and she realized vaguely that one of the candles, in going out, must have lit the pews behind them. She thought she should be leaving, the church all made of wood was a perfect fire hazard, but her limbs had no life in them.
"Come with us." She looks up to paralyzing beauty. Her hair cascades down her back like so many dark waterfalls, her skin a pale translucent white, her lips the only color stained ruby red. Her dark eyes are bottomless wells of mirrored darkness into which you could look and fall and fall forever, spinning through endless peace and serenity. They hypnotized her, drawing her nearer and nearer to the infinite pools of black until she thought she might be drowning, the way she used to look into Draco's eyes…
Draco…
"Come with me," she says in her melodic voice, cool harmony washing over Hermione's troubled mind and laying all the voices to rest. "I will give you peace…"
In the back of her mind, Hermione thinks there is a reason why she should not go with this woman who is clad all in red velvet and who promises peace and rest.
—and you must keep your soul, like a secret in your throat—
Behind her the flames leap higher and higher, eating greedily away, disregarding the holy water. A single rose petal begins to sizzle, its edges curling up in black ash, the black creeping slowly inward until finally there is only a single speck of white before that, too, dissolves into grey nothingness.
Before her is the woman, cool ice and perfection, promising peace, rest, eternal sleep from the ghosts that haunt her mind.
And the memory fades away, and leaves only dim haunting and recollection, and Hermione smiles, and takes the woman's hand.
Such beautiful perfection cannot possibly be evil.
"Change me…"
(And as always, innocent like roller coasters.
Fatality is like ghosts in snow and you have no idea what you're up against
because I've seen what they look like.
Becoming perfect as if they were sterling silver chainsaws going cascading...)